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Reve Rubio

Girl as Grave


Sometimes I think of the girl as the grave.

 


Tell me more about that.                   I mean
                sometimes I think of     the girl          as in
        the grave,                                        a corpseflower,       a closure,
                  a full cleave     and splinter,              a wound in the
                         earth,        a chokehold of dirt and feathers.

 


Do you mourn her?       Same way you’d mourn

                            roadkill,         a bird                     you’ve just run over.

Do you miss her?                    Same way a bullet,

                                     any bullet,                             misses the moon.
                     Two universes     over

                                                             I dreamt it would be lightning,
                                                                   or thunder.
                                       Another,        murky water.
                                       Another yet,

                                                              a wet kiss on the pavement,
                                                              a faltering crescent moon.

 

You think it would have happened regardless.       The body does
                what the body wants.         Sometimes I think of
                         myself as outside the body—                 a worm in the mouth,
                               a buzzing gnat              or two,    a swarm of pustules
                               and corpuscules,                      an unwelcome crawl
        under the skin.             I think of myself as disgusting,

                                                revolting, a ruin
                                               in the simplistic scheme of things.

 

                Parasitic,
                               I guess you’d call it.
Do you think of it that way?

Do you think of it that way?            Names are
              powers,
                               they’re arrows    that point
                                                     wherever you aim them.
                                        Sometimes, it’s a bullseye.
                                        Sometimes you miss.
                                        And sometimes you mourn.

 

 

Tell me more about that girl.            Ask another.
            Ask the wound she left. Ask the wound I wear.
                    I don’t speak for the girl, no one
                    speaks for her.        She is a closure.
                                                    She is a grave.   She is a ghost
                                                              of lightning, thunder, and
                                                              dark, dark water.

She is an absence of earth.
That speaks enough.

                                                              Ask me. Can’t you
                                           see me, eyes and
                                                  mouths and all? Can’t you
                                                                                                 call me,
                                                                                                             one name, any name

                                                                                                                                                                           at all?

deposition: wrongful deathmy father was finethree weeks before he died(or so the doctors say)not what happenedor why or anythingbut Sorrynow they ask meto craft a narrative—was he a religious manhow many drinksper week would you sayyou were close (yes or no)who was he to you—he was a man of excessWake Up Little Susie played for weeks& there were vegetable trays& vegetable traysbecause I said once I liked themas a child, I groanedbut I dream of bright greensport coats, shoes, tiesobscure wordstoo wide for their lines

A few words from the Entity wearing her Mouth


yes I   killed her,   but could you
blame me?              who wouldn’t
sharpen their teeth for a bruise
like this,      the shade of sweet–


dark sea    in a storm,     a wolf–
like      blossoming?   She didn’t
know        what to do      with all
these teeth,      kept biting back


at the wind.         She was scared
of something under       the skin,
was scared   to death         of me.
and who wouldn’t be?      some–


times the rot   is   far   too much,
and too fast.     surely you would
be afraid    if you pressed at the
flesh    in your arm,   watched it

 

give&give     and give      and ask
for nothing     (but you)      back,
saw it    darken with    waves of
imminence—  some tenderness

 

that aches   beyond    the bone.
I don’t think     you knew what
you were mourning,  if you did
why haven’t you       found my

 

body?      you must be waiting
for her    to come back,    girl–
whole,    washed and    holy by

ocean,  her one tongue covered

 

in salt.   or you want her to fall
hard and fast        from the sky,
cradling her ramshackle wings
and saying she will not fly again.

 

If this     is your worry,     it is
misshapen—     deformed by
her own    frantic hands. She
set fire to the girl      called it

 

kindness,  and you believed it.
how do  the ashes taste, I ask?
are you worried  about her, or
are you worried for     what it

 

all means for your lungs? truth
is she never made it    out of her
forest.  if she comes back  to you
it will be    wraith-like,    and in

 

pieces—the pounding on your
door,     the splinter     in your
teeth,     the parasitic sinkhole
in your stomach. She was gone

 

as soon as she had    our name
on her tongue, sharp as knives.
She ran to the woods one night,
wanting the moon—     nothing

 

                            but the     moon.

REVE RUBIO (they/any) is a sometimes writer, sometimes physics major based in Manila, Philippines. they enjoy writing about bodies: whether heavenly or earthly, monstrous or mechanical, purely theoretical or deeply physical. their writing has previously been published in HEIGHTS Ateneo and is forthcoming in #Ranger magazine and orange juice magazine, among others. you can catch glimpses of their work on their instagram @eig3ng1rl.

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